The Unconquered Throne

She was a bundle of love brought into this world with so much of enthusiasm, desire and care. She was exceptionally cute and adorable. But since the time of birth she turned out to be unfortunate in fate. Before her mother could take this bundle of joy in her arms and put her against her warm chest establishing a bond and showing her the warmth of a mother’s love, her mother closed her eyes forever. The case was complicated and no matter how hard the midwife tried she could only save the baby and mother died of excess bleeding.

Her mother died while giving birth to her, leaving her father in vulnerable circumstances and in a very tight spot. Her father worked for the king of that realm. He often had to leave at once for official voyage as soon as he got summoned by the king’s ministers. For this reason her father married again within a short period of time of his wife’s death. He had nobody to look after the baby. Until then the midwife took care of the baby. He had no other options and assuming the new mother will take good care of his little angel and give her a mother’s love, he got married and brought a new mother to his new born baby girl.

The good intention of the father marrying another woman whilst his wife’s death was still fresh, that she will be raised by a mother, she will be well taken care of and be loved, went into vein. A mother’s love was not written in her fate. The stepmother disliked her since the first day, the moment she stepped into their house. She was not only mean and wicked but she was a heartless woman who did not care about the newly born baby without a mother. She only cared of the wealth her husband, the father of the baby possessed. Since the stepmother did not look after her, she was raised up by an old maid who was also the chief of other maids.

When the father was home, the stepmother would pretend to be taking really good care of her as if she loves her dearly and is her own child. As the father stepped out of the house she would throw the tiny little baby on the bed and scream on top of her voice to the old maid,

“Imelda, take this trouble out of my sight. Why do I have to take care of a child who is not mine? Why did she not die along with her mother? She is a curse in my life.”

Imelda could not listen to all the curses and shouting that horrible stepmother brought out of her filthy mouth. At time she wished her father somehow heard what his newly wedded wife says and thinks about his darling daughter. Many a times she tried to tell the father or alert him about his newly wedded witch like wife but each time the stepmother stood right there glaring at her as if she will swallow her up like a python.

Her father named her Cindy. Cindy grew up with the unconditional love she received from Imelda. Since the step mother was not in favor of Cindy going to school her father had kept a tutor for her who came everyday to teach her different subject. She was intelligent and very smart. She grasped everything the teacher taught pretty fast.

Within a year of marriage the stepmother gifted her father with twin sisters. With two daughters of her own the stepmother became more insecure and spiteful. She somehow wanted to get rid of Cindy. She was always looking for an opportunity. Once when her husband was away for only few days due to work the stepmother had Cindy taken by her personal servant to the forest and left her there. One of the maids who had gone to pick wild mushroom saw the stepmother’s personal servant with Cindy and followed them. She saw him leaving her in the forest. When he left she quietly brought her back home and told Imelda what happened and how she found Cindy in the forest. When the stepmother saw Cindy in the house she went wild with rage and wanted to turn the house upside down and hurt Cindy but Imelda warned her if she did that she would tell everything to her master, to Cindy’s father. Cindy’s father confided in Imelda more than his own wife that she knew well and hard therefore, she let Cindy be and did not punish the maid who brought Cindy back from the forest. Cindy was happy growing up in Imelda’s care and love.

They say when the fate is not in your favor things happen, not good one though but bad and sad things. The same occurred in Cindy’s life. One fine day her father was summoned by the king. He had himself present at the palace. He was assigned to lead an official voyage. The duration of this voyage was quite long. Prior he would return home within a few weeks. At time it took about two to three months but this time he had to go for six months. He was disheartened to leave his daughter Cindy behind. He somehow knew or sensed that his wife was not good to her. He however knew Imelda would take good care of her. Hence after giving Imelda strong instruction to take special care of Cindy and leaving a good amount of money without the knowledge of his wife he left for the voyage.

One fine day when Cindy was taking her lessons from the tutor and Imelda was busy in the kitchen a king’s soldier appeared at the door with a message from the King. Imelda quickly answered the door. The soldier said handing over a message from the king,

“Please have this message delivered to Lady Williams. This is urgent.”

The stepmother was not home so Imelda opened the message that was not sealed and her eyes became wide from horror seeing the appalling message written there. She quickly rolled the message back and sent a servant to call the mistress home urgently. Then she went and hugged and kissed Cindy a hundred times. She knew the dreadful days of Cindy had approached, now that the father was gone. The message stated that the ship Cindy’s father was leading the voyage got wrecked and sank. It was believed that he together with other crew and officials died in that wreck.

When the father was alive Imelda could threat the stepmother of revealing her mistreating Cindy to her husband and that stopped her from harming little Cindy but now that he is gone she is the head of the house. Imelda could do nothing. At some point she thought of running away with Cindy, moving to an unknown place and raise Cindy with the money her father had left for her but then she thought, if she got caught then she would be killed as punishment and Cindy will have nobody to take care. She wanted to live for Cindy therefore she accepted the fate as it would come. Cindy was ten when the shipwreck took her father away from her.

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